Wesleyan plans to treat undocumented students as if they were domestic students & provide needed financial aid

Wesleyan University announced this week that it will consider undocumented students who graduate from an American high school as if they are U.S. citizens or permanent residents beginning with the fall 2017 class.

The new policy, which also applies to students who have been approved for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, ensures that all such students who are accepted will be provided with need-based scholarships as any domestic student would.

"Supporting these talented and deserving young people is the right thing to do and is consistent with Wesleyan values and our commitment to equity and inclusion," said Wesleyan President Michael Roth. "Many of these students were brought to this country at a young age by their parents and have lived here most of their lives. They ought to have the same access to a high-quality college education as any other student from this country."

The university has accepted undocumented students since 2000, but has treated them as international students, which meant they were competing for limited funds designated for international students, according to Nancy Hargrave Meislahn, dean of admission and financial aid.

Considering the students as domestic applicants "gives us much more flexibility," Meislahn said.

"We are delighted to throw the door open wider to welcome more of these bright and hardworking students who we know will thrive at Wesleyan," she added.

HARTFORD — The Senate on Tuesday approved a bill that would allow the children of undocumented immigrants to apply for college tuition assistance, even though they lack a Social Security card and other documents required to fill out financial aid forms.

"I'm ecstatic,'' said Alison Martinez-Carrasco,...

Across the U.S., more colleges are adopting policies that treat undocumented students or students with DACA status as if they were domestic students. But Laura M. Bohórquez, an education equity organizer with United We Dream in Washington, D.C., said, "This is definitely not a trend. The fact that Wesleyan University is doing this and is not limiting it to students who have DACA is something that most schools don't do."

She added: "The fact that Wesleyan is also looking to work with students and is willing to help them financially is a good example of what all institutions should do."

Bohórquez said she knows of only about 10 private colleges and universities that have a policy on undocumented students like Wesleyan's. Those colleges include Tufts University in Boston, Oberlin College in Ohio, and Swarthmore College near Philadelphia.

Katharine Gin, co-founder and executive director of Educators for Fair Consideration, a California group that helps low-income immigrant students pursue college, said that while the number of colleges that have official policies and publicly admit and fund undocumented students may be few, there "are many other colleges who have admitted and funded undocumented students, but have not set policy and/or may not wish to disclose this publicly.

"Unfortunately, most of the official policies I've seen are limited to DACA students," Gin continued in an e-mail.

Gin said that policies like Wesleyan's "are hugely beneficial to the undocumented students who are able to attend these schools with financial support. Moreover, these policies are emboldening to college-aspiring undocumented students across the country. They begin to consider private schools usually considered totally out-of-reach and believe that college is actually a possibility for them."

Gin said she thinks it's "very important for a university to proactively and publicly make an announcement" about such a policy.

"It's good for students and undocumented immigrants generally for people to speak out, stand-up, be up front with their support," she said, "especially when there's so much anti-immigrant rhetoric spewing forth around the country."

Wesleyan has had about two or three undocumented students at the school at any one time in recent years, Meislahn said. She hopes the new policy will draw in more, possibly a handful in every class.

"We are expecting that we will admit and fund more of them and we think that is great news," she said.

The university has been getting about 120 to 150 applications annually from undocumented students.

She noted that undocumented students and those with DACA status are ineligible for federal aid, but Wesleyan will meet their "demonstrated need" with university aid. It may include need-based scholarships, campus employment and small loans.

Meislahn said the policy change was made at Wesleyan because it "seemed to be right to be a little more public about that… a little bit more encouraging and outspoken.

"We see these students as very deserving," she said. "Many of them are very much like students sitting right next to them in their senior class, but they don't have documents."

She said that change in national immigration policies has "really stalled. We feel we can do something as an institution in terms of redirecting more of our funding to these students who have been here and are particularly hardworking and deserving of the same kinds of opportunities as some of their classmates."